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RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty: "The Shi'ite clerical regime of Iran appears to be intensifying its repression of the country's Sunnis under the guise of 'reorganizing' their seminaries. This is being done through the full implementation of a memorandum issued in 2008 by Iran's Supreme Cultural Revolution Council, a Qom-based conservative-dominated body whose 41 members are appointed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. President Mahmud Ahmadinejad chairs the body, although any decisions made by the council can be overruled by Khamenei." http://t.uani.com/ok44r3
AP: "Turkey says an explosion at a pipeline has temporarily cut natural gas supplies from Iran. The governor's office for Agri province, where the explosion occurred late Thursday, says Kurdish rebels are suspected of sabotaging the pipeline. The gas flow was immediately cut and no one was hurt in the explosion. An Energy Ministry official told the AP Friday that repairs to the pipeline were under way and gas supplies would resume in a week." http://t.uani.com/pYvvKN
YNet: "Iran's Information and Communications Technology Minister Reza Taghipour accused Israel on Friday of 'unmatched cyber terrorism' against nations the world over. Israel, he stated, 'Ranks first in cyber terror across the globe.' Quoted by Iran's Press TV, Taghipour accused Israel of 'backing cyber terrorism' and using 'cyber malwares... and many other forms of state terrorism.' The Iranian minister said Tehran was not only fighting back, but also implementing 'retaliatory measures.' In a similar report by the Islamic Republic's Mehr news agency, the minister announced the establishment of Iran's Cyber Command, meant to control and block cyber attacks against Iran. The new command, he said, will lead Iran's counter measures in the field." http://t.uani.com/qwcCIy
Opinion & Analysis
Karim Sadjadpour on CNN.com: "Given its conflicted relationship with Iran, the UAE has served as a kind of petri dish in which to test American policies toward Tehran. The Emirates are a prime target of international sanctions enforcement, and U.S. officials have invested considerable time and resources trying to rein in Dubai's thriving illicit trade with Iran. The UAE is also one of the largest U.S. arms export markets. Abu Dhabi has bought some of the most sophisticated - and expensive - weaponry available. What's more, in the absence of an official U.S. diplomatic presence in Tehran, Washington uses the UAE - home to some 450,000 Iranians, the second largest Iranian diaspora community in the world -as its primary vantage point from which to observe and interpret Iran's internal political and popular dynamics. As Tehran inches closer to nuclear weapons capability and the U.S.-Iran rivalry for regional power intensifies, the UAE finds it increasingly difficult to reconcile its internal contradictions. It has thus far tried to walk a fine line between satisfying its ally and protector, the United States, without provoking its looming neighbor, Iran. At the heart of the Iran-UAE-U.S. dynamic lies a simple irony: Iranian officials want the United States out of the Persian Gulf because they fear and mistrust it, yet the Gulf Arab nations want the United States to stay because they fear and mistrust Iran." http://t.uani.com/nUDneg
Roger Noriega in The American: "Rather than make the slightest effort to connect the dots on what these hostile regimes might be up to under our noses, the State Department rushed to quash the inquiry, saying in a July 27 reply, 'We have no reason to believe that Venezuela serves as an interlocutor with between Iran and Argentina on nuclear issues, nor that Argentina is granting Iran access to its nuclear technology.' Here is some of the evidence (which was provided to the State Department) that stirred Congress's interest: A document obtained from the Venezuelan regime bears the signature of Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez authorizing a secret payment last year of $250 million to Argentina for suspicious projects carried out alongside Iran. Another secret memorandum recounts a conversation in which Argentine official Julio DeVido offers Venezuelan Vice President Elias Jaua nuclear cooperation, and a third document substantiates Caracas's close cooperation with Tehran 'in the field of nuclear technology.' The foregoing evidence was met with indifference at the State Department. One would think from its swift and sweeping response that State knows all that there is to know about Venezuela. Unfortunately, that is hardly the case. In congressional testimony last month, senior State Department officials minimized Hezbollah's activities in the Americas and asserted that a suspicious Caracas-to-Tehran airline route was inactive. By tapping my sources in the region, I have been able to substantiate the activities of dozens of Hezbollah contacts and widespread recruiting, training, and fund-raising activities in the region, abetted by Venezuelan officials and by a notorious Iranian cleric, Mohsen Rabbani. It took me all of two minutes to confirm that the Caracas-to-Tehran flight departs every other Saturday from Chávez's private hangar, as it has for years; there's a reason the flight has been dubbed AeroTerror by Brazilian investigators. Perhaps the State Department's Latin America team is content to be in the dark when it comes to the threat of Venezuela's alliance with Iran. But it is very serious, indeed, for the department to withhold facts from an inquisitive U.S. Congress about the breadth and depth of those dangerous liaisons." http://t.uani.com/oGorJR |
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